Dysart Elementary School

Great school. My daughter is thriving and learning. She loves going to school every day and wakes up excited. The staff has a very hands-on approach toward learning. The staff is easy to communicate with and they value feedback. I could not ask for a better school for my daughter.

Our daughter absolutely wilted as a result of attending this school. Her confidence is nearly non existent and her interest in academics is completely gone and she is only in the third grade. We moved from England. She was happy, scholastically bright but now she is riddled with anxiety, chaotic and miserable. This school broke my child and I am uncertain how to repair the damage. We have two children who attend here. Our kindergartener is thriving, jolly, and outgoing. We do not have the same concerns for her as we do with our older girl. My older daughter stopped caring about her appearance, her grades. She has asked advice from me on how to make herself more invisible to her classmates and it is heartbreaking. I feel guilty of child abuse for sending her here and making her endure two years. With this school year nearly at a close and with plans to move over summer, I only hope a better school experience will rectify our mistake. If your child is gentle, shy, bright and fair minded do not send them here because this is a school for big personalities with thick skins. If you have a rowdy kid with a well of social overconfidence who can take playing the game “would you like a punch in arm or a kick in the leg?” With the other kids, then they will fair much better than my child did. It is not so much a case of bullying that she is experiencing as much as it is a severe shock to being submerged into a school of very dominant and aggressive children. Her academics dropped because she doesn’t want to ask her teacher questions, is too frightened to remain at school for tutoring, and is afraid to draw attention to herself by turning in work. It is a mess. I recommend you do not overestimate your children’s ability to cope with adversity. If you do send them here, I strongly recommend you join the parent groups and become active in the school in order to be a voice and form a protective shield for your quiet child. The teachers and staff have been great and as I said it was not a case of negligence or failure to control “bullying” that is not the issue. The kids are just dominating personalities and that makes for loud classrooms and antics and lots of time spent redirecting them back to academics. Naturally gifted children with strong personalities might do well here.

Both my sons have gone here and have made a tremendous improvement! The staff is amazing and friendly. The teachers truly care about the students and their well-being. We were previously in the Paradise Valley district and hated it. Dysart is an amazing school!

My daughter is in second grade at Dysart and our experience has been almost universally positive. Dysart did cut bus funding for students which caused some problems, and I feel their budget overrides are distributed to all but the students and teachers, but this school is great! My daughter loves her teacher, there has been no "switching", homework is encouraged and is expected daily.